<p>Does going to a really good (ranked one of the best in PA, and one of the 2 best in the county) public school (also very competitive) actually increase chances of getting into a good school (going to apply to very selective schools)?</p>
<p>Also, does being the only person in my grade to take a certain class (Latin) make me stand out well, along with getting an 800 on the SAT2 Bio in Freshman year?</p>
<p>Short answer, yes.</p>
<p>Going to a good school def. helps. I go to a relatively new school so our school's rating has been going way up each yr, and the amount of kids getting in to top colleges i going way up as well.</p>
<p>The Latin will stand out if you make it stand out on your app.</p>
<p>800 on SAT2 Bio is uncommon; how much it helps you will depend on the quality of the schools we are talking about (ex. 800 SAT2 bio for harvard probably won't help you that much, but it's still good).</p>
<p>Then again, I am not sure a particular high school makes too much of a different. I got into Harvard from a high school that hasn't gotten anyone into Harvard in about twenty years. My school is not great, and almost lost its accreditation. We are basically on probation right now thanks to No Child Left Behind.</p>
<p>yeah, my school is also new (only 2.5 years old), and we are renewing accreditation now, so that should be good. Penn State is big at my school (it's basically the mainstream good school that people aspire to go to), and a few have gotten into UPenn, where I'm also doing a summer science program this summer, so that should be good, though right now it's kind of ironic that I'm doing extremely well in all my classes, yet for the first time EVER, I'm not doing well in science (chemistry), mostly because of my first test that I didn't do very well on, along with this homework assignment that got "lost" (could've sworn I'd turned it in, but my teacher claims he never loses things, so I'm kind of screwed over and 10 points down the hole), which is giving me a B- now, which really sucks since I've gotten two A's and an A+ before in the last terms. Hopefully I can bring it up, and if not, I'm just glad that only the final averaged grade goes on my transcript, though it's still nice to be consistent and have an A </p>
<p>If I wanted to major in bio, would my SAT2 look significantly better?</p>
<p>I've always thought that the more applicants an accredited high school has (its ALWAYS a lot more than reg. high school) the more selective the college is in picking its next year students, for diversity purposes. That's why I think going to the best public school in California has its disadvantages; everyone is competing for the same thing, and the colleges KNOW this...</p>